Yesterday I traveled to Kent State University and with a friend walked around the campus looking for photo ops while also visiting the Kent State May 4th Memorial site. We came upon a greenhouse and found these beautiful pink flowers peeking thru the glass condensation covered windows. This presents a problem for autofocus lenses because the lens can focus on the flowers, as it primarily did on this photo, or on the water droplets, which it did in this second photo.

Flowers thru a wet window 2

Often in these cases the autofocus will shift back and forth and it becomes necessary to shift to manual focus in order to focus on your desired subject.

Another similar shot from a few years ago, at the James A. Garfield home, Lawnfield, in Mentor, OH, was shot thru a window covered with melted snow droplets.

Windmill beyond the water droplets

In this photo, the water droplets on the window are in sharp focus and in the background is a snow covered background with trees and a large windmill structure. A very different effect with the water droplets sharply focused.

The last image is back at Kent State with a succulent plant seen thru the greenhouse glass.

A succulent thru wet glass

All interesting looks and beautiful muted colors, shot thru wet glass. I think I’ll look for these photo opportunities more often now!

Advertisements

Share this:

Like this:

LikeLoading...

Related

About Kolman Rosenberg

My interest in photography began as a college newspaper and yearbook photographer during the stormy 1960s and 1970s. I was influenced by many of the great photojournalists and documentary photographers such as W. Eugene Smith, Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Gordon Parks, Margaret Bourke-White and other black and white photographers of Life Magazine and the earlier Farm Security Administration. Though many of these photographers documented the horrors of war and the plight of poverty, they also showed me the dignity and adaptability of human beings in their desire to prevail.

14 Responses to Wet Windows

This is an interesting new way for me to think about taking photographs. It adds more feeling to the photograph than just focusing on one subject. My favorite is the one taken at Lawnfield. You can actually feel the mood of the day. Thank you for the insight.
Patricia

Thanks Patricia! Yes, it can give a number of different looks and feels to the photographs! I’m glad it will lead you to trying some new ideas! Thanks for the comment and the comment on the Garfield photo!

LOL, I’ve been doing this for years and some of my favorite photos are through rainy windshield in my van. One is even in the show that you visited Friday. Thanks for stopping by and looking at our show. Michelle